


Collecting Resilience

by Freedom_Shamrock



Series: Love Square Week 2016 [2]
Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-09
Updated: 2016-12-09
Packaged: 2018-09-07 10:50:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8797975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Freedom_Shamrock/pseuds/Freedom_Shamrock
Summary: A reflection on some of the moments that motivate Ladybug.  Chronologically follows "How to Care for Your Unhappy Chat."





	

**Author's Note:**

> Love Square Week - Prompt: Fleeting Moments

In the last three and a half years, Marinette had gained a true understanding of what it really took to be a superhero. It wasn't the epic battles, press conferences, and public appearances. Those were the big things people remembered, and they were important, but they weren't her motivation and they didn't define her.

As a superhero, the most essential things were the little moments, the routines, the fragments of peace in between the chaos and danger. It was about finding what mattered enough to risk your life to protect.

She didn't recognize the first moment for what it was, until much later. When she saw her new friend Alya pinned by a car, she knew it didn't matter what she wanted. She had to act. Thinking and acceptance could come later. In the end, she realized that willingness to do the necessary was ultimately why she'd been chosen. It was why she was worthy, something she stopped questioning as soon as she understood it.

She initially missed the next moment as well. Chat inspired her during their face-off with Stoneheart and Hawkmoth at the Eiffel Tower. He'd taken her nearly crippling self doubt and converted it to confidence with a few words. Though he was silly and over-the-top flirty, he was just as aware of their responsibility, if not more, than her. He was her ballast, and she was his.

Almost a year ago, she and Chat had celebrated the first really nice spring evening with a game of rooftop tag. The sounds of Paris at night were deadened on rooftop, and it felt like it was just the two of them bounding through the darkness, with the smell of damp earth and early flowers in the air. To the Ladyblog, it had been just another night patrol, but to Ladybug, it was a link in the chain that made her stronger.

Her Cheer Up Chat Kit came out roughly monthly since its initial presentation. He had an unfairly large number of horrible days, and she was seriously considering asking him to move in with her. She wasn't quite ready for the identity reveal that would require, but she suspected it wouldn't be long before she was. She'd started researching apartments when it became clear her design projects required significantly more space than her room allowed. She'd even talked to her parents about it. By the time she found a suitable flat, she was sure she'd be ready. Tikki had been unsurprised when she revealed the direction her thoughts were going.

"The true need for secrecy between you is past," Tikki said, holding an oatmeal cookie in her tiny arms. "You've both grown so much in your powers. Chat's learned to throw off akuma control, so we know he won't reveal you." It had been a relief to find that her miraculous best friend and counselor was on board with this plan.

* * *

Ladybug forced herself to relax her tightly clenched jaw as she rushed over rooftops in the direction of Notre Dame. She'd hoped the run would improve her mood, but it hadn't. Instead, she felt guilty, torn, like she was skipping out on a responsibility. She'd been unable to hide her grumpiness from her intuitive partner, and he'd offered to help her as she'd done for him.

"Should I get my Chat blanket?" she asked with a sigh.

"No need." He beamed at her. "Just meet me back here after you finish your route. I'll have it all taken care of."

He'd beaten her, obviously by several minutes. Four candles marked the corners of the ladybug patterned blanket he'd laid out on top of the north bell tower. On close inspection it was very similar in design to the one she'd made. "What is this?" She realized it was the exact same question he'd asked her, and couldn't help but giggle.

He grinned at her. "This is my Cheer Up My Lady Kit. It lacks the originality and clever naming scheme of yours; I was afraid puns wouldn't help in this situation. So I added candles." He pulled a white bakery box out of a black backpack sitting just off the edge of the blanket.

She recognized the lettering on the side of the box. When had he been to her parents' bakery? "What have you got there?"

"Chocolate torte with ganache and raspberries."

She let out a squeal of joy. "Oh god, Chat. That's my favorite!" She scrambled over to him, careful not to knock over the nearest candle. "How did you even get this? Isn't the bakery closed? Didn't it close hours ago? Did you learn how to time travel?"

He laughed, honestly it was more of a giggle, and it was a sound that always improved her mood. He had such a nice laugh, and she gathered that he didn't get to use it much in his real life. He was a little like Adrien in that regard, and she wondered if maybe the three of them should just get an apartment together. She could put up with 27/7 puns and anime if they were happy, right? And Adrien had proven as resistant to akumatization as she had.

"I think having the embodiment of bad luck go back in time, even a few minutes, would be catastrophic." He shuddered theatrically, then offered her a plate. "I like this bakery, and the owners are really nice. I've helped them and their daughter out a couple times, and they always tell me that they owe me and I'm welcome to stop back."

Strangely, her parents had never mentioned that to her. "So Chat Noir frequents their bakery, then?"

He shook his head, looking smug. "My civilian identity frequents their bakery. Chat Noir only calls on them in a dire emergency."

"This is a dire emergency?" Oh god, he'd probably called and woken her parents up. She couldn't wait to hear that story tomorrow.

He dropped an exceptionally large piece of torte on her plate. "You don't get worked up over nothing, LB. But it's obvious something's going on." He pulled out two small bottles of milk. "Chocolate fixes everything that Lucky Charm doesn't."

She sighed and stabbed at her torte with her fork.

"I'm here if you want to talk about it," he insisted gently. "But I'm also just here to hang out if you'd prefer that."

"I have a big deadline coming up," she said, without consciously deciding to talk about it. "And while everyone tells me what I've done for it is good enough, that I'm ready, that I have a good chance at being accepted into this… thing. I'm not so sure."

"I can totally relate." He pushed the box to the side, setting his plate on top. "Can you turn away from me?" Once she had, he settled his hands on her shoulders. "If you're like me…" The pads of his fingers pressed down. "...you're holding a lot of tension in your body."

She made a non-committal grunt.

"No use denying it, Bug. I can feel it." His thumbs pressed in along her spine, stroking upward. "So I'm going to do this a bit and see if it helps. Is that okay?"

She nodded. He was too good at this.

"How are you sleeping?" His tone suggested he knew the answer to that.

"Sleep is for the weak," she mumbled, eliciting a snort from him.

"Yeah. I've been there, too." He continued to work on her upper back. "When I'm done, I want you to have your torte, and then I need you to promise you'll try to sleep. Okay."

"Yeah. Okay." This was one of those times when Chat was the voice of reason.

When she got home, feeling far more content and relaxed than she'd expected, she went to her desk and pulled out a green glass jar full of folded slips of paper. She jotted the date and the words "Cheer Up My Lady Kit" on a new rectangle of white paper, folded it, and added it it to the jar. Whenever being Ladybug was too much of a burden, her record of the most important small moments were a reminder that she was strong.

**Author's Note:**

> I apologize if this is more stilted than usual; it was a beast to write. It took me two tries (the first attempt ultimately became the tension prompt story), and it didn’t turn out at all as I’d intended.


End file.
